Boyz II Men made history on Wednesday (Dec. 18) as the first group to win The Masked Singer.
Disguised as The Buffaloes, the legendary trio snagged the crown in the season 12 finale over Wasp, which was revealed to be Mario.
When speaking with VIBE about their win, they joked, “We love making history.”
Shawn Stockman quipped, “It is one of those things that we’ve been blessed to do several times in our lives as a group and this is no exception. This is great to be on a show that we really weren’t very enthusiastic to be on at first.”
Of the lack of initial enthusiasm, he explained, “We thought it was going to be too much — putting on a suit of some sort, sweating, being hot, feeling claustrophobic and all that other stuff. And guess what? We felt all of those things. But in the midst of doing the show, we understood why this show is successful. We got caught up and we were like, ‘Listen, let’s win this thing. Let’s have fun, but let’s win this thing.’ And we made sure that we did all that we could to make sure that we sealed that deal.”
Wanya and Nathan Morris both noted that “it wasn’t easy,” but they collectively loved the show’s competitive aspect as a whole. “We didn’t expect that we would get as much from the show as we did, but we’re now very happy that we did it,” the crooners said.
If you watched the show this season, the Buffalo was initially announced as a solo contestant until they emerged as a trio, shocking everyone. When speaking on that reveal, the men had both reservations and solutions.
Nathan admittedly was “weirded out about the three of us being on there and everybody else being solo,” but their strategy for success was to hide their voices for as long as possible.
Wanya shared, “I remember calling Nathan and I was like, ‘Yo, dude [if] we gonna do this s**t, man, we definitely have to mask our voices’ […] We thought [what] would help as well is the fact that we’re picking all of these songs that nobody would expect that Boyz II Men would do [but] we didn’t have the expectations of going and [winning].”
Throughout the season, a concern of theirs was potentially getting eliminated before being able to choose the songs they wanted to cover. Some songs they wanted to perform, but didn’t were Pharrell’s “Happy” and Bobby McFerrin’s “Don’t Worry Be Happy.”
The men, on the other hand, loved making records like Toto’s “Africa” and Sam Smith’s “Too Good At Goodbyes” their own. After sharing a few petty albeit comical highlights from this past season with us including staring the Wasp down when they landed in the bottom two and he pranced around them, Boyz II Men confessed to knowing it was Mario once they heard him sing.
“I don’t think there’s nothing he can do to mask his voice. He’s probably one of the dopest vocalists,” Wanya noted. Nathan chimed in, “The only way is if you just don’t know his music.”
The trio also found it funny when the judges guessed they were B2K, After 7, Earth, Wind & Fire, and particularly Bone Thugs-N-Harmony.
Overall, their journey was an emotional but victorious ride and for that, they credit their brotherhood because it fueled their longevity.
“You can’t have a relationship last this long without having a level of respect and level of understanding who is around you,” Shawn said. “I think that’s why a lot of groups break up. A lot of marriages, a lot of relationships break up because they lost touch with who they have next to them. That is the most important thing.”
He continued, “Any type of collaboration, connection, relationship, partnership—whatever you want to call it—is knowing each other’s value and worth. Once you lose that, then the bond is gone. I don’t think any of us have ever gone too far away from one another to not understand that. Even with Mike, who physically had his challenges, and the only reason why he’s not in the group is because physically he just could not and can’t complete the task as a guy that is meant to do the same things we do.”
Shawn concluded, “We had our little tiffs and I do regret personally that some of that stuff played out in the public because we’re not that type of group. We’ve never been those type of people. If we had a problem, we do it privately and those types of things. Unfortunately, some of that stuff kind of leaked out, such as life. The point is that we’re still brothers. We still love each other very much and that picture don’t even say the half of how we feel about each other, how much love and respect that we have for one another in 2024. So it’s things that you learn about people, about yourself, and sometimes you have to grow apart for you to understand what it means to get back together. That’s Boyz II Men as a whole.”
You can watch The Masked Singer on Tubi, Fox, Hulu, and Disney+.
Leave a comment